When we moved into our apartment, the walls had not been patched or painted and looked pretty ugly. The carpets had not been cleaned and looked awful. I sent an email to the landlady letting her know that we thought the apartment was junk and she never responded. Four months later (yesterday), I got an email from my landlady's local "manager" (i.e. the person who gets cheaper rent because he's willing to deal with disgruntled tenants so that the landlady doesn't have to). I've been debating how to respond. I can write back the little helper and tell him this is ridiculous. I can write the landlady and tell her this is ridiculous. Or, I could post the email on our blog and tell all of you that this is ridiculous. I think I might do all three, but here's to the last option:
Hello Fantastic Tenants,
Just got off the line with [landlady] today. There are some units that are lacking extra paint to match the current walls, and as such, lack the ability to cover up any needed cover-ups! As such, she felt it most efficacious to have any of you who are need of paint take a small one or two inch section of paint from an unobtrusive spot in your unit to the nearest paint matching store (Walmart, Home Depot, Lowes, etc...) and buy a quart of matching paint. Then, send your receipt to her with your next months rent and she will reimburse you by taking off that money from your NEXT months rent. She feels this will be a better process than having a paint shop have to come out and get a sample form each unit and then provide the paint, as that would be MUCH more expensive! Let me know if any of you have any questions. Thanks for being so great, and have a VERY Merry Christmas!
Merry Christmas indeed. I can't wait to spend it scraping paint samples off the wall, matching it at Lowes, and painting our piece of crap walls with it. At least this alternative is MUCH cheaper for the landlady!
3 comments:
BAHAHAHA! What's the going rate for the labor? Take THAT off rent. Unbelievable.
WHAT?! This is crazy! I love that they try to soften the demand by calling you "fantastic tenant." Totally charge her for gas and labor, and make sure you address the invoice "Dear fantastic landlord -- thank you for understanding that charging you for my time is MUCH less expensive than charging you my hourly billable rate." =)
Um, Dear fantastic tenant? Wow, that kills me. As a landlord I can tell you that it can be stressful to get phone calls about things like that but I figure that's why people pay rent. They expect things to look a certain way and as long as it's reasonable the landlord should take care of that. And personally I think it's easier sometimes to just paint the whole room while it's empty than to try to match little sections - they don't really end up looking that good. Sorry and good luck. Like he said, Merry Christmas!
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